Page 26

Chapter 25

A Secret Door

As I turned back, Adrita was in my path, her feet planted and her eyes still blazing at me, blocking my troubled pacing. She may not have had my brother’s stature, but she was as immovable a force as he’d always been.

“Stories have been whispered for centuries that another Leóht would be born. Many have believed it to be you. It’s why you’re watched so closely. Even the thralls watch you from a distance and tell stories. Now that you’re no longer an acolyte, and back in your mother’s suite, they leave gifts outside your door that your mother hides.”

The role of Leóht was myth and legend. That wasn’t me. I could even think the word, let alone own the title. My mind tried to shy away from it like a too-bright light. Yet I knew there was some truth to her words as I remembered all the shells and carved stones I’d seen my mother discreetly removing lately, kicking one aside only this morning as casually as I’d just kicked a pebble into the water. Other, still hazy, memories rose of wielding light from within myself while sitting with the goddess as a child—something I’d never been taught but that had felt as natural as breathing.

“Adrita, be serious. I was the worst acolyte. I know now I’d make a terrible vessel if I were to become one. My looks confuse people, I get that, but if the people need another Leóht, it can’t be me.” She needed to understand she was wrong. They were all wrong, if that’s what they thought.

The last decade of my life had been spent isolated, even amongst the other acolytes. People just looking at me made me skittish now. The thought they wanted me to save them had my stomach dropping. I was struggling hard enough trying to save myself, let alone everyone else. We were all doomed if they were looking to me as their savior.

“And yet you alone amongst our generation can wield light from within.” She raised a challenging eyebrow at me.

I opened my mouth, but no response came, so I snapped it closed again. I was unable to deny it now. She’d seen it herself. I still wasn’t convinced it made me a Leóht.

“Look, I’m not saying whether you are or aren’t a Leóht—that’s between you and the goddess—so settle down.” Despite her abrupt tone, she reached out and cupped my cheek briefly, a tender gesture you might share with a loved one—a daughter, maybe—that didn’t feel out of place coming from Adrita. “All I’m trying to tell you is that you don’t need to become anything, Alula. You were born a Vessel of Light in the purest sense.

“You don’t need a ceremony or a title either. It’s not for the elders to decide, and nothing they say can change who you are. I admit they have broken far too many acolytes, but there are some amongst us—like your mother and me, and like you—who resisted in our hearts. Who held fast to who we are inside. We are the ones who can fight back, even if we have to do it from the shadows, so we do it for the others that can’t.”

Her words humbled me, but they didn’t feel like they related to me. I had done nothing to earn them. “I want to fight back, Adrita, but I can’t be the one person everyone looks to. I don’t know how to be that person.”

“Being a Leóht doesn’t mean anyone is chosen or destined for greatness, Alula. That includes you. You don’t have to be anything. Leóhts are both the genesis of vessels and a path forward for those who follow. A Leóht shines a light because they are light. Do you understand?”

Blowing out a deep breath, I nodded. A path sounded doable. Isn’t that what I’d been searching out already? A new path to the goddess?

She wasn’t done though. “While I did say you were the only other acolyte who didn’t require an external source of light, you are not the first to be born that way. Others have come, but they never survived their first flush of light to rise through the ranks. The elders deemed them too dangerous.”

A flash of anger rose, bringing heat to my heart. “The elders killed them?”

“Yes.” Adrita’s anger matched my own as she snapped out the word, and her hands clenched into fists. “That you survived is a credit to your mother. I don’t know how she got the goddess to intervene, but knowing she has appeared after so long tells me more than your fate is rising.”

“So, what do I do?”

“You walk your path, Alula. Nobody else can walk it for you.” Her simple answer had me straightening my shoulders and holding my head higher again, matching her courage. “You can do this. You already are. But more than that, you will because we need you to light the way.”

She cupped her palm to my cheek again, only this time, a calm energy flowing from her hand that helped to steady me. In shock, I realized she was sharing her light with me. It felt the same as when I stepped into the pool.

The urge to lean into the feeling was profound. I’d been so focused on my horror at being forced to share my light that I hadn’t thought about ever wanting to share it.

“You’re not weak, broken, or alone, although you may have felt like it,” she added. “I’ve watched you. You’ve just been biding your time. You have an inner core of strength you’ve held to, even when your eyes were downcast. It’s what drove Elder Welkin to obsession, because he couldn’t break you, despite how hard he tried. People have stayed away to keep you safe. The only thing you have to accept now is that your time is coming, and there are those of us who will fight with you to make sure a new path is found.”

A new path was everything I had wanted, the need that had driven me this far.

“My mother wants to hide me in the town. She hasn’t mentioned any of this, but she tells me very little. Is this what she doesn’t want me to know—that I could be a Leóht? Or is there more?” I’d known my mother was hiding something bigger since she first dunked me in the pool behind us.

“I’m not privy to your mother’s thoughts, but I assume so, amongst other things.” She shrugged as she dropped her hand and shifted away from me.

Adrita had only just told me she didn’t hide things and challenged me to step up; now, she was being vague and not meeting my eyes. If there was something even Adrita sidestepped, it had to be significant.

Narrowing my eyes at her, I confronted her head on, stepping in front of her again. “Amongst other things? Details, Adrita. I need details, remember? What do you know of the first Leóht?”

The codex didn’t include much about her beyond that she died at the hands of the Fallen. If people were comparing me to her, I needed to know everything.

“The Leóht never shared her secrets with my ancestors, so they’re not within my memories. They are within your mother’s, though, as you are both descended from her.”

“Oh.” I blinked rapidly. I’d always felt a deep, unseen connection to the vessels in my family line. Finding out the Leóht was one of them made her seem less daunting, more familiar. No wonder people watched me, though. It was all starting to make sense, except for the fact I hadn’t known. “Nobody ever told me that. Why would they keep that from me? Even Elder Welkin has never mentioned it.”

“Elder Welkin has never wanted to encourage the myths about you, for his own reasons.” She shrugged lightly. “What I can tell you is that when vessels pull light into themselves and then wield it, it drains the light but also our energy, especially complicated wieldings. We have to replenish our energy regularly. The Leóht may have had an endless source of light within her, but it was incredibly powerful, and she had a mortal body, like you. Wielding drained her energy the same way it does for us, sometimes more so. If you’re drawing light from within yourself, you have to be careful not to wield more than your body can endure. I suspect you’ll need to train your body before you can wield your own light in increasing amounts. You may feel kickback every time you wield until you’re stronger.”

“That would explain why I’ve been feeling so fatigued.”

“Hmm.” It was her turn to narrow her eyes at me, and she was a pro at it. I fought the urge to look away. “I can see another question brewing in your brain, probably more than one. Just ask.”

Her earlier blazing attitude had cooled. She now stood still with her hands demurely folded in front of her as she waited for me to answer. A calm, serene, unthreatening vessel…or a vessel who had learned her lessons well as an acolyte many years ago and employed them now in her own interests. She wasn’t a female to be underestimated.

If she insisted, though, I was going to ask. “What do the elders get out of us sharing our light with them? We already create all the lumis they want, and they still can’t wield, even when we share our light.” It was something that had always baffled me.

“You have been kept in the dark, haven’t you? Most acolytes gossip about this sort of thing.” She seemed taken aback a little, and I tried not to take it personally. “Neven naturally have longer lifespans than humans, by about twenty years. Vessels more so—we naturally live about forty to fifty years beyond humans because light-wielding imbues us with health and vitality. We share that effect when we transfer light. Have you never noticed how old all the elders are, though nobody knows how old?”

I shrugged. “It’s not something I’ve ever thought about.” We didn’t celebrate or discuss age within our culture, especially once we were past our youth.

“There’s a reason for that. The elders discouraged celebrations around birth and aging a long time ago in an attempt to divert attention from the fact they have extended their life even further than that. Much further.”

There was no end to their manipulations of our world. “How much further?”

“All the nexus vessels have memories of the current elders at the time the citadel rose. They weren’t elders at the time; they were probably about your age.”

I was speechless. No wonder they controlled access to us. We were the source of their prolonged life.

“Why are there no vessels the same age then?”

“The unnaturally prolonged life is only a benefit to the elders, not nobles, consorts or vessels. We suspect it is a secret they discovered in the raising of the citadel. Besides that, vessels don’t tend to die of old age anymore…especially once they are no longer considered attractive.”

“What— oh. ” The question came out before my mind connected with what she wasn’t saying. They were killed. I wanted to ask why, but it seemed indelicate. Dodging a direct answer on that one wasn’t something I could blame her for. I couldn’t imagine talking about your own potential death would be easy.

“And the other question you were trying not to ask?” She changed the subject abruptly, not giving me the same courtesy. She was going to make me ask it rather than just tell me, making my cheeks heat as a blush spread. The question that had popped to the front of my mind felt inappropriate, especially after what we’d just discussed, but who else could I ask?

“I felt you share a trickle of your light with me just now,” I said. “How do you transfer light to the elders and lords? I mean, I know now that sex is involved, but how does the light transfer work? Is it involuntary or intentional?”

A muffled crack from the rear wall had us both halting to peer into the gloom cast by the orb Adrita was still holding; only, there was nothing but loose shale falling from higher up, plunging to mingle with the shadows. Adrita stared briefly before she continued on.

“Hmm. Well, intense sexual high is the other benefit for the recipient, and the vessel. If they have a connection, it brings euphoria. Light transfer between people is different to imbuing light into an inanimate object. It can be involuntary when you’re young, and emotions can bleed through along with your light, but you will learn restraint. It’s about heightened emotions, which is why sex is an effective way to do it, although sex without some feeling will have only minimal transfer. You have to be careful, though, because hate is a heightened emotion too.”

Having sex with someone I hated sounded horrific. Adrita stiffened as she spoke her last words, and my heart broke for the life she’d been forced to live.

“Do not apologize,” she said, holding up a finger to halt my words, as if she’d sensed my intentions. “It’s a fate that has befallen every vessel since this light-damned citadel rose. We’ve learned to turn it to our advantage, to take control where we can, but it still does not make it right or pleasant. Use that pity to change things for the acolytes who come behind you. Forge a new path they can follow.”

“It’s not pity I feel,” I said too quietly, as an ache built in my throat. “I’m in awe of your courage. I admire you.”

“Don’t admire any of us just yet. There are some things we could not fight and heavy burdens we’ve had to bear to survive, but we are the survivors. Far too many didn’t make it. It’s why the elders try to keep us broken and punish any emotional outbursts—to keep our power manageable and within their ability to control. It’s why they killed the first Leóht, and I assume why your power was blocked until you were old enough to manage it. Be mindful of who you let touch you, Alula.”

Chills ran up my spine at her words.

“Why?” I needed to know what she was hesitating to say. It was my turn to not let her turn away from it. “I thought you were going to give it to me straight?”

Her spine stiffened as she stared me down, unflinching. “I only hesitated because you didn’t take the whole Leóht thing well, and I thought that would be the straightforward part. You mentioned a taint within the light, and I suspect I know what it is. So, if you want it all, I’ll tell you, but you will never be able to unhear it or hide from it. Are you sure you want to know?”

I took the lumis orb she still held in her hand and cupped it within both of my own. It looked the same as other lumis, if a little brighter, but its pure light called to me, like an ache deep within me. This is what all lumis should feel like. “Adrita, feeling the taint within the light is what drove me to this point. If you won’t tell me, I’ll find out another way, and probably take reckless risks to do it.”

Her abrupt nod was a slice through the air that had thickened around us. She didn’t soften her next words. “Vessels can do more than share our light with people. We can also drain it.”

A chill swept through me that had nothing to do with the cavern, and my legs faltered.

“In what way?” She’d mentioned the elders draining the world earlier, but I assumed she’d meant metaphorically.

Instead of answering me, she reached out and touched the orb I still held, brushing a sigil over it with her fingertips then placing her palm over it. The lumis within the orb dimmed until it lost its form and became shimmers that hung in the air for a moment. She groaned softly when she was done and shook her arm out.

“Your light packs a punch,” was all she said.

I recalled my mother pressing her hand to the floor and absorbing my protective wielding. It had stunned me at the time, but so much had happened since I hadn’t thought about it again.

The concept felt foreign to me. The codex and our training instructed us to be careful when wielding, as once wielded, lumis could not be unmade. At most, it could be re-wielded by an exceptionally strong vessel.

“What does that mean for us?” I couldn’t comprehend why it was something that needed to be hidden.

Adrita sighed as she stepped to a rocky outcropping and sat down heavily, seeming older than her years, where a moment before she had seemed so vibrant. I sat on the ground at her feet and pulled my legs up tight, as the shadows pressed in closer after the last of the shimmers winked out.

Reaching out, I put my hand on her leg. It was my turn to comfort her. “Tell me, Adrita.”

Her hand shifted to sit over mine as she spoke. “Light never dies. It’s the eternal spark of creation and simply flows into a new form when we wield it. Light is within all of us to some degree; even humans, though they don’t recognize it. It can be shared through touch, even unintentionally. But there must be a balance in all things, so it can also be drained, often by a person with ill intent. If they aren’t a light wielder, the effect is limited. You may not even notice, but it will still happen. When it comes to light wielders, the effect increases based on their strength in wielding. It’s one of the reasons we’ve become a culture that doesn’t hug or express ourselves physically, although most don’t understand why we don’t do it.”

She sighed, heavier this time, her thoughts seeming to go inwards momentarily, perhaps remembering something from long ago. “There’s always been a sigil for draining, though knowledge of it beyond the elders is forbidden. It was traditionally used when a wielding went wrong. When applied to lumis, it essentially undid the wielding, returning the lumis to its natural state of light. One of the original light wielders discovered a combination of sigils that could be used to drain light directly from objects. Eventually, they discovered that included living things too, with an effect far greater than simple touch.”

“How.” The word was bitten out. The answers I’d sought had been here all along, with the nexus vessels, but my mother had refused to tell me.

Fiddling with a necklace at her throat, she hesitated a moment again, and I got the feeling this subject was personal for her. “The sigil doesn’t work directly on people, but it can be applied to metals, particularly jewelry, although in that form they are too weak to drain you completely. When an elder is wearing one, they can take more light than a vessel is willing to share. Beware Elder Welkin’s jewelry, particularly his diamond necklace.”

The implications were endless and terrifying.

Adrita stood abruptly, dusting off her gown and the conversation. “It’s time. There’s something you need to see. Come.”

Adrita yanked on my arm, giving me no time to dwell on her words. She was surprisingly strong and moved swiftly, tugging me along behind her up the stairs. Her tense posture and firm grip told me she wouldn’t suffer any arguments about it. Not that I was planning to, but I’d prefer to still have the use of my arm when we got there.

“Adrita, I’m coming. You don’t have to drag me.” I wanted to learn everything she had to share. I’d worry over the implications later, when I was alone. No longer would I let my emotions interfere with finding answers.

“Sorry. We only have a short window before everyone else finishes their evening meal. If we’re spotted, we risk everything. I can tell you more later.”

I glanced behind me, trying to be discreet. Where was Nier? I couldn’t tell if he was following as we rounded a bend. I’d have to hope he was.

She stopped just before the first lumis orb we passed in the passageway at the top of the stairs. Adrita raised the arm she still had in her grip and sketched a sigil onto it that flared brightly, then seemed to sink into my skin. It wasn’t a sigil I’d ever seen before, and I’d never seen one performed on a body, but I was starting to realize we’d been told very little of real value as acolytes.

“What sigil was that, and what does it do?”

Adrita dropped my arm but gestured for me to follow her. She sighed when I didn’t move. “I’ll explain as we walk.”

At my nod, she started a pace I found it difficult to keep up with. She was taller than me, with a longer stride, so I was almost running.

“Most of the orbs in the upper levels of the citadel have an additional sigil applied over the top of the lumis that tracks light, including the light within us. That sigil stops the lumis orbs from tracking our movements. Sigils wielded on bodies don’t last long, so it needs to be reapplied after about an hour. If you want to move around undetected, you’ll want to learn that sigil or figure out how your light works beyond creating orbs, although it doesn’t matter as much once you reach the lower levels. The elders never bothered with it down here. They have no interest in the movements of the thralls, so long as their food is on the table and their clothes are washed.”

A sense of vindication filled me. “I’ve always suspected the orbs were tracking us. They felt watchful to me, even when I was young.”

“It’s good that you can sense the intention of wielded lumis,” she answered over her shoulder as she kept up the fast pace she’d set earlier. “Most vessels can’t do that.”

We’d moved into a lower section of passageways I didn’t recognize, even with all my recent wanderings. “Where are we?”

The passageway had gotten narrower and more barren as we’d descended. It was similar to the passages around the vessel pool, so I hadn’t noticed the subtle differences at first; yet now that I was looking, I noticed these passages looked more unkempt, with broken mortar in places and eddies of dust kicked up with our passing. There was something in the air that felt ominous, and I instinctively wanted to turn and leave. The feeling grew the farther we traveled.

“What is this?” I asked, hoping Adrita would know what I was referring to, because I couldn’t seem to articulate what was unnerving me.

“This area has had sigils applied to the walls to make it uncomfortable for anyone not an elder or a member of the Apex Flight to enter. Most people naturally avoid entering without even realizing it. You need to push through the sensation. We’re almost there.”

Eventually, she slowed as we approached the opening to a new passage on our left. She reached out and touched the right wall, then drew a sigil onto it. A slight shimmer ran the length of the wall, barely discernible if you weren’t looking for it. She flicked her fingers, and the wall seemed to separate—or an impression of it did—and floated across to the other opening.

She grinned as I raised an eyebrow at her before stepping forward into the opening. Following close behind, I froze when I saw two guardians standing on each side of a door at the end of a short passageway. They were members of the Apex Flight—Aeron’s mysterious, elite force of guardians.

Panic hit me like a wave. Had Adrita betrayed me? I looked over my shoulder to see a shadow rapidly advancing down the hallway toward us, but I discreetly held up my hand in a stop gesture, and it halted. I couldn’t risk both of us getting caught.

The guards looked bored and were paying us no attention. Adrita looked over and whispered, “That sigil acts like a mirror they can’t see or hear through, but we can.”

“You could have warned me,” I hissed. She smirked, and I got the impression she kept her consort on his toes.

Her face sobered as she looked back at the door. “We can’t linger. The effect isn’t perfect, and the shimmer of the wielding will attract attention if they’re bored enough to stare at it, but I wanted to show you.”

“Why?”

“Because that room is known as the Sanctorum, and talking about it isn’t the same as the feeling you get from standing in front of it. It’s only spoken about in whispers, and it’s why we have no ceremonies to honor our dead. All our dying are taken in here by the elders. As we suspect, so are the many Neven and human thralls who seem to disappear from around the citadel, including your own grandmother when your mother was a new vessel. In my lifetime, no vessel, acolyte, or human who has gone through that door has ever come out again.”

My breath grew shallow as I realized the unsettling feeling hadn’t just been coming from the passageway. It was also coming from that door, or whatever was beyond it. Energy seeped through the cracks, like tendrils of a vine looking for a new host to smother. It felt wrong. Lumis and light-wielding had always been the very essence of life to me, the creation of something new. It had a purity about it. Even the lumis orbs that watched felt subtly distorted but had an underlying sense of life.

This, whatever it was, felt like life tainted so gruesomely that only death remained, and it was hungry—a demanding, twisted hunger that pulled at me.

The guards stirred and looked behind them at the door, as if we had disturbed something within by our very presence.

“Can we go?” I whispered. The longer we lingered, the more the hunger reached for us.

Adrita’s gaze was locked on the door, but she nodded, almost unconsciously. I pulled on her arm, and she let me drag her away. Once we were out of sight, she reached out and deactivated the sigil she’d created.

She seemed diminished somehow, her earlier spirit battered. I wondered who else she had known that had gone through that door.

“What’s in there?” I asked, my words halting, once we had some distance and our voices would echo back to the guards. My need to know only slightly outstripped my desire not to know.

“We’re not sure, but I believe it’s part of Nur’s original gift—lumis so powerful it was hard to look at. It was broken apart before the citadel rose, and that is the piece the elders retained.”

“They broke it?” I was aghast. This wasn’t in the codex, but I didn’t doubt her.

Adrita nodded, her gaze far away, as if she wasn’t seeing the bare walls around us but a distant place. “I saw it in the memories of my ancestor who was there. The gift was a thing of great beauty. It’s depicted as one orb in all our artwork, but it was actually five orbs. There were five plinths, four in a square and one in the center, the orbs circled each other above them, like stars with their own gravity. It existed in its own perfectly balanced dance.

“The original wielders came from across the four realms within our world. The high lords and high lady couldn’t agree on where the gift should live, or who should have access to it, or when. They couldn’t agree on anything, and they all became suspicious of each other’s motives. Their solution was to break it apart and each hold a piece, but they were messing with something far bigger than themselves that they didn’t understand. They caused not only a rupture in the gift, but a rupture within this world, for the gift was tied to it.”

“Where are the other pieces?”

“The original guardian warned them not to proceed, and the Leóht tried to prevent them, backed by the vessels, but a mania overtook the leaders of the realms. The guardian was subdued, and the Leóht was killed—I don’t know how. My ancestor fled. When it was done, the high lords and high lady who had overthrown the Leóht each took a piece back to their four realms. As far as any of my ancestors know, the fifth piece has never been found, and the guardian has never been seen again. We’ve been so cut off from the other realms since our citadel rose, I have no idea what has happened to them, or what disasters they may have wreaked with their pieces. What we have done is beyond imagining.”

“You mean the wraiths? Is whatever they do in that room creating them?” My steps stuttered on the cobblestones and I almost fell, but Adrita reached out and righted me.

“Yes. One of my ancestors saw the first wraiths dropped from the citadel as it rose under the cover of darkness. There’s been a steady stream of them since. There’s been attempts to stop the elders over the years, but none have survived the attempt, and our ability to wield grows weaker with every generation, until now.” She turned to me, her eyes glinting in the dim light. “We have known all too well that you can live in the light and still despair, for there is an unseen war being waged in Lumière that has taken too many lives.”

I had no words, nor any idea how I was supposed to help do something that generations of vessels before me had failed to do.

As we approached a lumis orb, it started shedding shimmers.

“Does that happen often around you?” she asked dryly, with an eyebrow raised in my direction and a jerk of her head toward the orb.

“The shimmers? Don’t the orbs do that randomly?” Her question threw me, not sure what she was referring to.

She shot me a pointed look. “No, Alula. It can happen when an orb is unstable, and that is what we’ve told the elders over the years, but it mostly happens when an exceptionally strong light wielder is having trouble regulating their emotions nearby. The lumis reacts to them.”

“Oh.” It was clear I was the one having trouble regulating my emotions. I’d released much of my earlier build-up into the pool, but Adrita’s revelations and the secret door had my emotions, and my light, spiking rapidly.

We continued on in silence, Adrita allowing me time to process everything she’d revealed. When we reached the upper passages, they were much busier, the evening meal having ended.

“I’ll chaperone you back to your room,” she said quietly, and I nodded.

I couldn’t face anyone right now, or make small talk. Many people stared as we passed, but none approached. I assumed it was out of respect for Adrita.

She only stopped when we reached my mother’s suite, reaching up to touch my cheek gently again when we halted in front of the door. I leaned into it, needing the contact and warmth. I felt a flush of light gifted through the contact, surprising me. It felt foreign, but it came with a wash of care and concern that helped settle my overwrought thoughts.

“You’re so young. I wish I could give you more time to adjust, but this fate is already upon us. Whatever they are doing in that room has escalated in recent weeks. Since your presentation, Elder Welkin has been spending even more time in there, when he’s not whispering to people. Don’t underestimate the threat he poses. I don’t want to see you end up in there.”

“Elder Welkin? He’s involved in this?” My heart sank through the floor. He’d been a specter, hiding behind every corner all day.

“Of course he is, and whatever he is planning will not be good for you.” She stilled, then pulled back and looked around again. Her expression was fierce, and yet full of hope when she looked to me again, pinning me with her gaze. “Don’t fret. You’re not alone, Alula. We vessels may bicker amongst ourselves, but we all agree—your mother most of all—that this needs to end. Even if she feels the need to forge her path alone, it’s not the only way. Don’t be too hard on her for it, though. She tried to give you time, and it’s a gift you shouldn’t waste.”

A quick glance over my shoulder at the gathering darkness at my back had the fierceness fading as she smiled gently. “I hope one day soon you’ll trust me enough to tell me about the Fallen who haunts your steps. We shall need him before this is through.”

“I…you…uh…” I tried but failed to form useful words. A denial, a deflection, anything, but nothing came to me. I ended up blinking at her awkwardly. She didn’t wait for me to figure out a reply, just turned and left with a smug grin, leaving me with my mouth hanging open.

Pushing open the door to the suite, I was glad to find all the lumis covered and the rooms darkened. Only moonlight filtering through the windows greeted me. If I hurried to bed, I could avoid my mother’s return. My questions for her would have to wait for another day. I needed this day to end without answering or asking any more questions.

Nier slipped through the door as I closed it. He crowded me, backing me against the door without touching me and dropping his hands to rest against the smooth wood. He breathed deeply, as if trying to settle himself.

Just having him near soothed some of my jagged edges.

“You’re killing me with the constant danger,” he muttered. “I don’t want you anywhere near that door ever again.”

There was no argument about that from me. I didn’t want to go near that door ever again. The pervading wrongness of it was still haunting me. I’d felt an echo of it in every piece of lumis we’d passed on the way back. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that whatever was going on back there was connected to the tainted lumis and the echoed screaming within the halo.

It wasn’t the most pressing worry, though. “How did Adrita know you were there?”

“I don’t know.” He looked over my head and stared at the closed door with a troubled frown. “Maybe there’s something in her memories that gave me away.”

When he looked back down at me, a million questions I couldn’t answer were reflected in his eyes. He’d heard everything she’d revealed.

“I have no answers for you tonight,” I said. I was overloaded and my light was surging almost painfully in response.

He nodded as his eyes dipped briefly to my mouth before he dragged them back up to mine, betraying where his thoughts had gone. “I should go.”

He should go, it was the sensible, and safe, thing to do—that was undeniable. It was the choice he’d made every time the world intruded on us. Perhaps the choice he had been making in his own world too, if the casual hints he’d dropped of his life on the ground were any indication. To live unseen within his shadows. Until now.

Tonight, he lingered. No mask. No hood. No shadows spilling between us.

In a world that no longer made sense to me, a world where I had followed the path my elders laid before me and found myself in a nest of vipers, maybe the only rational course of action was a reckless one. One that broke their rules.

So, I said the words that had my light pressing against my skin, begging to be let out.

“You should stay.”